US Cinema: Spike Lee (Week 1)

 Introduction:

• Released in 1989
• Written and Directed by Spike Lee, who also plays the main character
• Cinematographer - Ernest Dickinson
• About racism, rather than a racist film
• Main stream US cinema does have a strong racist tendency
• DTRT demonstrates how a film with a strong anti-racist agenda can itself be caught up in racism and also the questionable representation in the instance of female characters

Although the film is 30 years old, we can relate it back to the modern day, the film focuses on social problems. Such as Racist police, state sanctioned violence murder.

The film ends with a roll call of victims of police brutality, with the recent events of the murder of George Floyd and the way this has galvanized the Black Lives Matter movement, goes to show that the films message has not been addressed. 

THE IDEA OF NATIONAL CINEMA:

Superhero Films - One of the only true American film genres

The problem of the national, how we talk about cinema belonging to a state.

National Cinema - reflect the place in which its made, but will also shape people's sense of the place.

Early examples of national cinema approaches tend to focus on certain key directors e.g. Bergman 

Critics felt that a nation is never monolithic, there is some variety and difference.

BLACK CINEMA:

This is defined by films by/or starring or featuring themes related to an African American experience.

Early/Silent period - studio system - Hollywood is a predominantly white affair.

Black characters usually placed in servient/bit part roles.

Production code - set of specified rules that filmmakers are required to follow at all times.

Even in positive representations, the place of characters (black) is of a servient one. For example Rick in Casablanca - given very little role beyond playing films crucial song.

Spike Lee is aware of all this and actively sets out to blow it to bits. Refuses both positive and negative black stereotypes.

Lee is a pioneer and DTRT is a film that challenges the status quo. He doesn't seek to make white skin luminous and beautiful but to do so for black people.

Oscar Micheaux - Black independent filmmaker works successfully in this genre. Made 35 feature films between 1918 to 1938 

Micheaux is key to show the long tradition of black filmmakers finding their voice.

Get beyond the idea that mainstream is always bad and that Avant Garde is good - more that there's a dialectic in place. Some kind of connection/challenge - what America means and how it can negotiate conflict in society.

A number of liberal anti racist films created after WW2 - seeking crossover audience. Black Actors and filmmakers began to gain recognition in 1960s/50s

Civil Rights movement became more violent in the late 70s. - Sweet Sweetback more in Semester 2

Success of Sweet SweetBack resulting in Hollywood being alerted about the commercial protentional of a large urban black audience which resulted in a cycle of Black exploitation films.

These were low to mid budget studio financed films such as Super Fly , Black Caser and Blacula.

These included: strong black protagonists with anti authoritarian attitudes, predominantly black urban settings, rhythm and blues soundtrack, montage, hyper masculinity, liberated mysognistic attitude.

A recent film that looks onto this period is 'Dolomite is My name' - catches the space between margin and mainstream really well.

In the 1980s - especially towards the end, Hollywood did accommodate a distinct cycle of Black US films, Key Pioneers She's got to have it & Townsend Shuffle.

Films were commercially successful : Boyz N The Hood, New Jack City

The 1990s/Early 2000s are certainly defined by a certain kind of racial post modernism. Roles were racial qualities are aligned, not following logic of race - colourblind storytelling which differs from previous periods.

Election of Barack Obama in 2008 is taken by some to be the culmination of this period.

BLM movement formed 2013, preticipated criticism in the film industry and led to the #OSCARSOWHITE protest at the 2016 Academy Awards.  - more films about black experience but also a less white film industry

Race becomes central to politics in general, intensified by donald trump, has an effect which moves out into all of society - film industry. 

Films like Moonlight, Get Out and Black Panther were released against this backdrop of political struggle. Fueling Political change.

DO THE RIGHT THING:

Semi-independent Budget; Lee's own company partnered with Universal

The film depicts unequal race relations in a specific part of new york - unequal race relations in film industry

Political act - cultural and industrial context

Jacquie Jones - American filmmaker, editor of the Black Film Review from 1989 to 1993. Jones note the list of names fictional and real of young black men killed by police - claims this is the pivot point in which the film moves.  She says the characters are quite thinly drawn and more types of people than people. Lee states that the film wouldn't be possible if each character was fully developed.

Salim Muwakkil - senior editor of in these times; he notes that the film unflinchingly acknowledges problems in the black community such as ''Male Irresponsibility, Brutal child rearing and entrepreneurial affetti.'' Lee doesn't avert his gaze from these but neither does he judge them. 

Zeinabu Irene Davis - compares Lee to Oscar Micheaux, like Lee, Micheaux directed his own film. Notes superficiality of female roles - Rosie Perez character is heavily sexualised. 

although the film depicts a distinct local, it does put the main stress on one individual - Mooke

No sense of wider city here - no public transport, no school, no community center, no recreation area. These are decisions Lee has taken to show New York in a particular way. The narrative of the film revolves around the individuals living in this place.

Lee cleaned up the location of the street before shooting.  - cleaning and tidying up to show it in a more positive light - consequence = erasure of culture in this society as some of the things that give black culture sense (religion) and some of the things that were dangers such as drug dealing are taken out of the game by Lee.

He may be making a choice not to show the white structure of power - not to show the racist structural elements of society and instead show a place where hypernated Americans all negotiate their differences in an oppresive order that separates them

DTRT has a stress on self reliance - Mooke works and wants to get paid, DTRT brings a black agenda into line with a broader thrust of Reagenism 

Reagenism - the political ideology that shaped the US during the 80s - mistrust of welfareism - mistrust of state offering support or engaging with society in any kind of way.

in DTRT there is no social safety net - no schools no social services, we don't know if the people who live there are able to live.

This films logic is governed by the political climate of Reagenism

is DTRT over stretched? is it unreasonable to require black filmmakers to always tackle social issues in all the films they make

having Lee as clear author puts all controversy on Spike Lee not the Studio - Authorship

Marks Spike out as not like the other films we watch. 

We might ask if Lee or the film has an overly bleak view on human beings - racial tension scene - under stress people will unleash hateful anger on an a racial other.